Moving In
by erinmorgan
Summary: Steve arrives a little too early on moving day, and Tony never told Pepper why she had to move out.


**AN:** _This is my first, and probably only, Stony fic. A friend on tumblr as me to write it, so this is dedicated to her. For mypatronus-is-a-tardis:_

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"What are you doing here?" Tony hissed, drawing the door closed behind him quickly as he joined the tall blonde outside his enormous home.

"Moving in?" Steve stated like a question, his thumb absently jerked over his shoulder toward the moving van. His face and voice stated that he was not in the mood to take any of Tony's bullshit.

"Not for another two hours!" Before Steve could argue, Tony continued, "Pepper's still here!"

"Wait, she doesn't know?" Steve asked.

"No! I wouldn't hear the end of it from her. Not to mention the revenge she'd try," Tony trailed off with a tone caught between worry and curiosity.

Steve stared at Tony incredulously, taking a step forward, using his height advantage to glare at Tony. He barked, "You didn't tell her?"

"God, you're not even living together yet, stop fighting like an old married couple."

Suddenly, the door opened again, and the woman in question stood before the bickering men. Tony and Steve jumped apart partly from surprise, partly from embarrassment, and partly to get out of the way. Pepper was the leader of a line of Iron Man suits each laden with large cardboard boxes miscellaneously marked. She herself only carried a small, seemingly light box. Still, Tony hopped after her, offering to take it, insisting that she shouldn't be exerting herself. The angry woman responded with a quip about testosterone and her abilities, brushing Tony off.

Shaking his head at the self-obsessed man, Steve entered the house and joined the conga-line of metal suits. When he deposited it by Pepper's feet, she thanked him genuinely and assured him that she wasn't mad at him. "I'm finally just sick of Tony," she explained. "Besides – he's obviously been more into you than me since he met you."

Steve looked away embarrassed by the comment, and even more uncomfortable when Tony sauntered over and pinched his ass in front of his now ex. When Pepper's final box was out of the house, she dismissed the suits and spoke quietly with Tony for a long time. Steve looked away again when she kissed Tony goodbye, convincing himself it was out of courtesy not jealousy. Still, he couldn't help feeling relieved when she finally drove away and out of sight.

"Alright, let's do this!" Tony clapped as if breaking up a huddle. He called his suits back and Steve's boxes were soon being marched into the house. Steve tried to carry a few boxes himself, but Tony stopped him and dragged him into the house through another door. "Oh, no. We're not working. We're celebrating," he said, eyes wide and eyebrows raised in a suggestive way. Steve let Tony have a long, lingering kiss, but slipped away and jogged back to where the suits were depositing his belongings. He knew the house like the back of his hand, having been there more than his own apartment in the past few months.

"Why are you so insistent on working?" Tony grumbled. "Why does no one else know how to relax or celebrate?"

Steve rolled his eyes and settled on the couch to flip a few boxes open, deciding where to start. He'd save his clothes for last as an excuse to celebrate with Tony in the bedroom when everything was finished. The smirk on Steve's face piqued Tony's interest, and he finally began to help. It took all day for the two men to go through each box. Steve tried to hide a few from Tony, but the millionaire managed to get into each and every one of them and make the soldier blush furiously. The last box not filled with clothes caught Tony's attention, and he dove into it excitedly.

"Seriously? How old is this thing? Does it even work? _How_ does it work?" Tony jibed, fiddling with the knobs of the '40's radio. Steve tried to bat the radio out of his hand, and snatched it away when Tony was suddenly distracted. The genius had noticed the television set inside the box, too, and his face lit up like a Christmas tree.

"No way!" he exclaimed. With a slight struggle, he lifted the box and carried it to the bedroom, ignoring Steve's worried shouts. The soldier ran after him to find the genius clearing off a tall surface facing the bed. He carefully placed the old television with its nine-inch box screen, two-foot wooden frame, and two stubby knobs in the center and dusted it off lovingly. "I always wanted one of these," Tony said as he kicked back on the bed to test the angle.

"Seriously?" Steve asked, pushing off the doorframe he was elegantly leaning on.

"Yeah. Daddy dearest was all work, no play, so I never had a television until he invented a good enough version."

"And so you're nostalgic for a 1940's television?" Steve commented, walking toward Tony slowly. "You weren't even born in the '40's."

"I like a lot a things from the '40's, Capsicle," Tony huffed indignantly, refusing to look at Steve and obnoxiously staring at the ceiling pretending to be offended.

"Hey, I'm just glad you're not kicking it to the curb," Steve laughed, stretching out next to Tony on the bed, humming his appreciation of the mattress that sank beneath him.

"Let's try it out, huh?" Tony suggested, the smile of kid in a candy store on his face.

"Nah, let's try something else first," Steve winked stupidly.

"And what's that?"

"You wanted to celebrate?"


End file.
